COACHING MASTERS DRAGON BOATERS: PERSPECTIVES FROM A COACH AND AN ATHLETE
Dr. Be'na Callary1, Jus2n MacLellan2, Sco9 Rathwell2, Dr. Bradley W. Young2 1Cape Breton University, Canada 2University of O9awa, Canada
Funding provided by:
Correspondence: Be'[email protected]
Results – Five Themes 1. Who are MAs? Understanding the highly successful professional character MAs bring with them from outside of sport.
Athlete: MAs have families, professions, they’re very successful. The coach has to respect that he’s talking to a person who has achieved a lot in life. MAs are confident, they’re at a high skill level. They want to train and compete at a high level. I like to train, I like to stay fit. I like the challenge. I really like goals in my life and it’s also a nice place to socialize with people who have common interests. This is an environment where I have all that. Coach: I love coaching MAs because I know they want to be there. They're not being forced by anybody. I’m able to get a lot more out of somebody who wants to be there. They all are accomplished and they all have so much to bring to the table, they have families and jobs, so I'm teaching them through sport but they're teaching me as well -‐-‐ life skills. Some2mes I don't know everything about what I'm talking about. We have doctors on our team that tell me, 'ok, maybe this isn't good for us'. So I'm learning from them at the same 2me as they're learning from me, which is cool.
________________________________________________________ 2. MAs need to know the informaRon jusRfying coaches’ decisions, and will demand such informaRon if it is not forthcoming. Athlete: If one of the athletes isn’t able to follow the program, you know, 100%, what ends up usually happening is the results for that person aren’t as good. So that allows the coach to make decisions based on results from tests and then when it comes to [selec2ng] the ‘A’ boat, that person may sit out some races, but that’s ok because that person is aware of that. Coach: With teenagers, if you tell them to jump, they're going to say ‘how high?’ And a 40 year old is probably going to say ‘how high’, but they're also going to say ‘why?’ They want that explana2on. We are a highly compe22ve program, so the 20 best paddlers are going to be in the ‘A’ boat. We do fitness tests that give us empirical data about who the 20 best paddlers are. So we have that [data] and we can get it back to the athletes so they know we're not just subjec2vely picking who is on the boat. It’s a tool for us to show them about the decisions that we're making. They like things to be explained with transparency. I find MAs, way more than younger athletes, are willing to say 'hey, why aren't I in the ‘A’ boat?' So you have to be able to give them real data as to why you're making decisions.
________________________________________________________ 3. Coach sets direcRon for training but MAs exercise choice for autonomy. Coach direcRons are guidelines that may be ignored without consequence. Athlete: It’s nice to come and just do my workout. Having a coach takes the guesswork out of it. I can just focus on what I’m trying to accomplish. It’s like a check to make sure that I’m not over-‐ or under-‐training. Coaches of MAs need to have a plan AND make sure the plan fits with the athletes’ goals. That’s the key to it. You have to find out what the athletes want to do. When you’re dealing with athletes as adults, it’s got to be more of a joint effort. [My least favourite coach] was a dictator so everything he did along the way, it was as if you had no say in anything. Coach: We say at the beginning of the year with the high performance programs that if you want to be in the ‘A’ boat, then this is what you're going to have to do and these are our expecta2ons. So then the onus is on them. If they don't show up to prac2ces, if they don't do the fitness tests, if they're not training on their own, they won’t be in the top 20. And if they're ok with that, then that's fine.
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Results – Five Themes conRnued 4. Coach plans flexibility into programming to enable MAs to accommodate demands and duRes in their lives Athlete: My favourite coach is always conscious that everyone is an adult and many have children so everyone’s managing [responsibili2es]. He offers sugges2ons and is suppor2ve so that the athletes don’t feel like they’re short-‐changing any of their roles in their lives. He doesn’t state, “for this day you have to do this.” We have women that are maybe doing their workout on a Friday evening instead of Thursday. He just wants to encourage the team members to complete the workouts that are assigned in any way that they can. And if they miss a workout, then that’s ok, you know? He puts a lot of trust in the athletes to complete the rou2ne but he knows that not everyone does the whole work. Since he puts a lot of 2me and energy into the workouts, we all said it would be good if we could do at least 80% of the workout. Coach: Factors we have to deal with when coaching MAs are jobs and families. Those are big factors and they play into it. A lot of 2mes they can't make it to every prac2ce or every rega9a because they have a family obliga2on, so you just have to understand that and be willing to work with them through that. If they can't make the prac2ce, then maybe you suggest something else that they can do at a different 2me.
________________________________________________________ 5. Coach should communicate Rmely, technically-‐sound feedback during training, and respect MAs, warranRng a paRent/posiRve coaching approach Athlete: Coaches have to be educators. I think they should get educa2on courses on communica2on (laughs). They don’t have to be at the highest level of coach training but their communica2ons skills have to be at a level that’s appropriate for an adult and they have to have pa2ence and they also have to be able to communicate basic skill knowledge and properly demonstrate it to an adult. The coach has to realize that they’re talking to a person that is within the same age range but s2ll has to be able to convey how things can improve. Not everyone is at the same stage [of proficiency], so the coach has to work in a way that the adult doesn’t feel centered-‐out or insulted. The coach has to be really careful about how they speak to adults because they can feel as if they’re inadequate and then they lose their confidence and not want to carry on in this sport. Coach: I am learning from my athletes -‐ communica2on (laugh). Communica2on's a big one, how to talk to people, communicate what I want them to do so that they can reciprocate. I've learned how to be pa2ent (laugh), that was a tough skill working with older adults. I find adults are very stuck in their ways some2mes. If you say something, it's not necessarily going to click the first 2me. Li9le 2ps or adjustments need to be said again and again. You can get really frustrated if you say something and they just don't do it. So you have to be able to recognize that ‘hey, maybe they are trying, I just need to be pa2ent and give them a li9le bit more 2me to get where I want them to be’.
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Masters Athletes (MAs)
MAs are 35 years of age or older, formally enrolled in a spor2ng event or club, and acknowledge that they regularly train in prepara2on for compe22on (Young, 2011) In a coached context, MAs have a wide variety of mo2ves for sport involvement, past experiences in their sport, and perspec2ves on compe22on and how they prefer to be coached (Rathwell, Callary, & Young, 2015)
MAs with coaches noted swimming and non-‐swimming related benefits in having a coach (Callary, Rathwell, & Young, 2015) MAs with coaches wanted coaches to: • have experience and knowledge • hold them accountable • plan and structure their training • support them at compe22on (Callary et al., 2015)
Purpose
To explore the match between what a female Masters dragon boat racer wants and needs from a coach, and what a female dragon boat coach working with MAs does with her team.
Method ParRcipants: • Female dragon boat racer, aged 58, engaged in this sport as youth and MA; • Female dragon boat coach, aged 22, engaged in this sport as youth; coaching MAs for
6 years, undergraduate degree in kinesiology, graduate training in sport psychology • Both compete interna2onally but with different clubs in different ci2es
Data collecRon: • One semi-‐structured interview with each individual separately, each 2 hours in
dura2on and conducted one year apart
Data analysis: Thema2c content analysis (Braun & Clarke, 2006) • Read 50 pages of par2cipant transcripts – allowed for understanding of convergence
and divergence of data • Line-‐by-‐line analysis • Induc2ve analysis into themes • Themes ve9ed three ways by research team
Discussion/ Conclusion As noted by MacDonald et al. (2009), the successful character that iden2fied many MAs outside of sport was acknowledged as well as the fact that coaches needed to respect these experiences when communica2ng with athletes. The coach saw this reality as daun2ng yet also beneficial for her own learning. Results illustrate MAs’ preferences for how a coach communicated, underscoring the need for pa2ence and posi2vity, discre2on and respect when providing feedback to athletes. The athlete and coach explained how the protocol for selec2ng compe2tors was implicitly known, but that data from tes2ng procedures and accountability checks were useful in jus2fying decisions to MAs. The coach claimed MAs needed to know the ra2onale for certain drills, emphasizing the respecpul approach to facilita2ng adult learning that is in line with adult learning principles suggested by Knowles et al. (2012).. The remarkable commitment of MAs was noted in light of other life du2es. Stevenson (2002) noted the highly entwined mix of conven2ons, e2que9e, and norms associated with being a “serious” MA. The coach felt that this commitment demanded quality coaching, whereas the athlete felt it earned them a teacher-‐coach who could communicate 2mely, technically-‐sound feedback during training. To help MAs remain commi9ed while naviga2ng life demands (Young, Callary & Niedre, 2014), it was pointed out that coaches afforded alterna2ve workouts and op2ons within an overarching structured program so that athletes never felt that their training was compromised. Having a structured coach-‐directed plan that athletes could pursue with autonomy was cri2cal, especially one that considered MAs’ varied mo2ves for challenges and goal pursuit. This is in line with Rathwell et al.’s (2015) findings that MAs wanted varied coaching approaches according to their interests. The athlete appreciated she could exercise her autonomy in choosing to pursue the demands of training, or to choose not to without cri2cism. The coach saw the import of se'ng a program with expecta2ons for hard work but accepted it was up to adults to direct themselves in pursuit of such standards.
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